The Google AdSense team shook things up yesterday when they finally made public new policies regarding the use of images with their ads that were supposedly to fix ‘ad blindness’ and to improve ad optimization. Probloggers Darren Rowse and Abe Olandres quickly blogged about it saying that “you cannot place images near ads in any way that suggests a relationship between the image or the ad – even if you put a line between the image and the ad” and that there’s a “possibility that the plugin Adsense Beautifier could violate Adsense Terms of Service (TOS)” respectively.
In all honesty, I became worried, scared even because 1) I am among the many bloggers out there who uses the AdSense Beautifier plugin and 2) I am also among those who customized the images that the plugin uses. These two factros alone made me a prime candidate for being banned from using AdSense, which would be a real nightmare because I’m still waiting to hit the $100-mark and recieve my very first AdSense check.
So I nearly stayed up all night and worked to change the images the AdSense Beautifier plugin is using for my site. Guided by probloggers Abe and Darren, I first decided to change the images into something that are not closely related to technology, computers, gadgets and health which are the topics I mainly blog about.
I browsed my del.ico.us bookmarks remembering that Max Limpag once bookmarked a site about thousands of icons you could download for free. Taking some time to carefully choose the new images I’m going to use, I went for people or cartoon characters, books, even oriental images. It took me no less than ten minutes of editing the image for the plugin, uploaded it into my site and refreshed my blog pages to see the final result. It was pleasing at first, the images were even cute. Until a thought flashed in my mind (which may sound paranoid), that since I blog about other things aside from tech and health-related topics, what if Google displays ads related to that non-tech and non-health post and as pure coincidence, the new images I’m using were closely related to those ads then someone from Google sees that post, that ad with that now closely related image beside it and say; “Tsk tsk. This guy wouldn’t just listen eh, so no more AdSense for him from now on.”
So I was back to the drawing board…literally. I tried again looking for other images that are so remotely related to the possible topics I’m going to blog about, but that possible scenario I mentioned before kept bugging me. Nearly giving up and resigning myself to deactivating the AdSense Beautifier plugin, an idea – a braingasm suddenly struck me.
I said to myself, ‘Since the whole idea of the plugin was to prevent ad blindness without violating the AdSense TOS and enable the ads to blend in with my blog’s theme; why don’t I make a new image that would do just that, literally even.’ I fired up Macromedia Fireworks and created a set of small black squares similar in appearance to the styling of the links on my sidebar. The end result, you could see right below this post and all the other posts to come.
It’s safe, it’s neutral, it blends perfectly with my blog’s theme, it simply works.
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Julius aka "Jhay" Rocas has been blogging since 2006. He is a certified geek. New Media publisher/Professional blogger and Internet ninja. Youth activist. He blogs about tech news, gadgets and social commentary. 
{ 9 comments… read them below or add one }
images next to ads are not a good idea, related or not. this risk is no longer worth taking.
I’m using your plugin on one of my sites (http://itsvista.com). I deleted the graphic that showed gadgets, and just left the one that shows the abstract images. I can’t see Google having a problem with this one unless I get an ad for wet leaves or I suppose for abstract art.
Have you thought about mailing Google and asking them? I'd be curious to see what they say…
Hello, That's a great idea.
AdSense beautifier does not violate Adsense Terms of Service (TOS) itself, but depends on what images we use on it, right?! Any idea for AdSense beautifier images please. Thanks a bunch.
Have a great day and gud lak!
here's what i'm thinking. instead of using other images, use google referral links beside the ads. like the firefox referral or adsense referral. you don't even have to put a border between them, because they are both Google ads.
i actually improvised for my own blogspot adsense beautifier with a random image script. The clicks did increase. When I read this issue, I immediately removed them. Guess what, clicks increased more
In all honesty Ade, I just don't like them.:wink:
Why not the standard images?
Great idea. I'll try this for 1 day to see if there are any changes. My 1st day without the plugin was horrible. My CTR went down about 50%.